The clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1883-1888, 1887-06-08
Barnum on Temperance.
THE GREAT SNOWMAN EXPLAINS HIS
ATTITUDE on TOTAL ABSTINENCE.

/ should have been in my grave
twenty or thirty years ago if | had not
quit drinking Intoxicating liquors, as |
did in 1S4S. | had contracted the habit,
and built up a blind, unnatural appetite
for strong drink. and really liked the
taste of every kind of liquor, though l
suspect | liked the effect still better. /
began to grow careless and "slothful in
business" and put off till next week
what / ought to have done to-day. For
tunately, / discovered that the habit
was destroying my health and worldly
prospects, and by g most determined
will power ] conquered the powerful
appetite which | had acquired for in
toxicants and broke it forever. ! knew
that habit was second nature and that
the unnatural appetite for strong drinks
was stronger than nature itself, for
every glass of liquor drank increased
the desire for another glass, and so on
ad lbitum; and, therefore, TO have con-
quered such a fearful habit was the
saving of my life, and all that was
worth living for.
When l found myself secure from
falling back into the whirlpool of intox-
icants, / felt as a shipwrecked person
must feel when his life is barely saved
by the life boat while many of his fell
low-passengers were still struggling in
the waves; being saved himself he Is
excitedly anxious to save others. / felt
so overjoyed at being snatched from
habit which was surely dragging me
down to misery and death, that | found
my greatest pleasure consisted IN circu
lating the temperance pledge, giving
temperance lectures free of charge all
over the country, and using every effort
in my power to enlighteu public senti-
ment in regard to the fearful delusiOn
of strong drink. | particularly urged
young men and young women, as | now
do, 70 start right in life, to avoid this
greatest evil III the land, because it is
the parent Of every other evil known,
and is sure to utterly destroy nine-tenths
of those who form the drinking habit.
| begged them to touch not a single
drop, because, like opium, morphine and
other narcotics, the drinking of liquor
calls for more, more and more, to pro-
duce the same effect that little pro-
duced at first, and thus an artificial and
unnatural appetite was created that
proved irresistible in a great majority
L
country that their health, happiness
posterity, depended upon whether they
started life's journey on whisky, beer
and other brain muddlers, or on cold
water, natures beverage, which gives
the clear brain, the firm hand, the
strong resolution and the noble ambi-
ton TO succeed in life financially and
| 4 I 1 Al
have started thousands of young persons
on the right track, and that their ex-
ample will save hundreds of thousands
of their posterity and fellow beings. It
is one of the greatest pleasures of the
evening of my life that | can look back
and see the multitude of young married
men, who were running themselves and
their families by this social, delusive
and absolutely fatal habit of dram
drinking, whom | have been able to so
convince that they were on the wrong
track, and to induce them to switch off
and take the temperance track for life.
Many wife and son and daughter have
clasped me by the hand, and with
streaming eyes have thanked me for
having saved them from misery and
degradation, and saving their father
and husband.
Young married men in Bridgeport,
who were my tenants, | have induced to
abandon the use of liquor and tobacco
on condition that l would build and
sell them a house on credit to be paid
for by instalments. Numbers of such
men with growing families have in a
few years owned the houses they lived
in, clear from debt, they having saved
the money by cutting off their rum and
tobacco expense, and earned more money
by their renewed energy, strength and
ambition. There is not one redeeming
quality in the liquor-drinking habit.
1t does no possible good, and it intiicts
all manner of evil on its victim, his
family and friends. 1t is the most de-
grading, poverty-breeding and utterly
destructive infatuation that ever par
alyzed the hopes, comforts and charac-
ters of the people of this otherwise
| blessed America
|